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Bussiness Situation

Schiphol Telematics (ST) has provided telecom services such as tailored Internet, voice, IPTV, and network services over its own network to businesses in and around Amsterdam Airport Schiphol for more than 20 years. Critical airport functions reliant on ST's services include a number of supporting processes, such as payment services, airport operations, and baggage handling systems.

Despite having a robust customer base, ST is a relatively small company, with only about 95 full-time employees and 15 contractors. Thus, it is constantly managing its costs and employee footprint to maintain maximum business flexibility and agility. As one aspect of this strategy, it relies on managed services providers for all of its IT operations, including the most important Microsoft business applications its employees use.

In 2012, ST selected Avanade Inc. to replace its then- incumbent managed services provider for its Microsoft Dynamics AX ERP system, Microsoft SharePoint, and reporting services for its Microsoft SQL servers. ST credits Avanade with providing higher-quality support and going the extra mile to forge a business partnership with it.

"Avanade is a true business partner, giving us the flexibility we need. Plus, our costs have gone down and our service quality has gone up"

Edwin Meijera member of ST's management team

Results

ST reported that despite moving from another managed services provider, it is still achieving substantial business value with Avanade. The company has been able to better focus on its core business with Avanade supporting it and achieve productivity gains while keeping its managed services provider-related costs to a minimum.

Using Avanade allows the company to avoid hiring a team of five to seven full-time employees to manage Microsoft applications and is also helping it improve its business agility and flexibility. Avanade has helped ST achieve these benefits by being a true business partner rather than just a service provider. By maintaining two individuals onsite at ST, Avanade understands the needs of ST's customers and internal users, helping provide the competitive agility and flexibility ST needs.

With Avanade's support, ST has continued to be able to have robust Microsoft applications without needing to invest in internal IT staff resources. IDC projects that over five years, ST will avoid IT staff hires worth an average of €462,000 annually with Avanade.
Further, the depth of skills and expertise offered by Avanade means that ST is achieving more value in terms of features and change management than it did with its previous managed services provider. It takes significantly less time for Avanade to implement a new feature or major change, meaning that ST gets more value from its managed services relationship, worth an average of €321,700 per year over five years. Also, ST's employees are spending less time managing the managed services provider relationship with Avanade, adding further time savings worth an average of €102,700 a year.